High-resolution computed tomography (“CT”) volumes of the chest are commonly used to diagnose abnormalities in the ribs. Current technology provides CT volumes of the chest with up to several hundred 2D slices. Thorough evaluation of thoracic CT scans frequently requires physicians to identify and track the individual ribs structures in the volume data. This can be a tedious task as the ribs occupy multiple slices within the data. More precisely, the ribs typically cross through the axial planes at an oblique angle, thereby making their examination even more problematic. To analyze the CT volumes, the radiologist must scroll through all slices, and view the contents of the ribs while tracking the ribs through each slice. Moreover, given a rib in an arbitrary slice, the radiologist must scroll up and down to determine the number of the rib.
Current technology also provides a method of visualization by means of straightening each of a plurality of ribs in the volume data based on a centerline in each of the plurality of ribs and generating a 2D image based on the straightened ribs. By generating these 2D images, the tedious task of reading the volume data is simplified by reading 2D images representing the ribs in a straightened configuration. Despite these improvements current technology offers only very limited possibilities for changing viewing parameters such as the perspective for viewing the ribs in 2D images.